Use of computing devices is becoming more ubiquitous by the day. Computing devices range from standard desktop computers to wearable computing technology and beyond. One area of computing devices that has grown in recent years are gaming devices and virtual reality (VR) devices, which rely on a graphics processing unit (GPU) to render graphics from a computing device to a display device based on rendering instructions received from the computing device. In gaming devices, a scene produced on a display device can be oriented or modified based on user input (e.g., movement of a gamepad button or stick to cause movement of the orientation of the scene, introduction of items into the scene, etc.). Similarly, in VR devices, the scene produced on a display device can be oriented or modified based on user input, where the input may include detecting movement of the user's head (e.g., detected movement of the head-mounted VR device).
In any case, the user may desire to change the scene at any given time, but in conventional devices that provide rendering instructions to the GPU when the rendering instructions are ready, the GPU may render the image too early in a current frame refresh of the display device before the display device renders the image in the next frame refresh. In this case, any changes to the scene occurring after the rendering may be delayed until the next frame refresh by the display device. In other cases in conventional devices, the GPU may render the image too late in the current frame refresh such that the image misses the next frame refresh, and is displayed in the following frame refresh. In either case, this may result in a perceptible delay experienced by the user of the device.